Using a LFTR on a ship is a bad idea: The fuel is slightly water soluble.

In the LFTR the plan is to burn the actinides and transuranics; only the fission products are sent to the waste stream.
Of course this implies that the chemistry of the fission product removal should be selective enough to capture just (or mostly) fission products (and not transuranics).

I thank Robert Hargraves for the clarification.

In the LFTR the plan is to burn the actinides and transuranics; only the fission products are sent to the waste stream.
Of course this implies that the chemistry of the fission product removal is selective enough to capture just (or mostly) fission products (and not transuranics).

I thank Robert Hargraves for the clarification.

No, the difficulty is not to burn U-235 (which burns well, but there is little of it left in the reactor at that point), but to “burn” U-238.
The reason is that when U-238 is hit by a neutron, it becomes Pu-239, which is fissile; and we just need a new neutron to hit the Pu-239.

But then, for the reaction to continue, each Pu-239 that fissions should emit at least 2 neutrons, one to hit a new U-238 (to produce new Pu-238) and the other to fission another Pu-238.
This is not easy to obtain and it is the issue which sent the whole nuclear industry to try to build the “fast breeders” since Fermi time (and “burning” in the process immense… amounts of money since then); the other road was the MSR/LFTR.

Regarding the second question (“there will be transuranics in the LFTR that will not be ‘burned up’ and will have to be stored for 250K years or so?”), the answer is:
a) yes, there will be actinoid waste left by the LFTR too
b) but after 300 years the radio-toxicity will be 10 000 times less than the one by the existing reactors.
So that’s the difference: the LFTR has transuranic waste, but it lasts 300 years, and that is manageable

I wrote a letter to the official opposition party in Alberta about Thorium reactors (the government in power only sees one line – oil), and about the possibility of creating a new industry in Alberta, because the oil is not going to last for ever. No one knows about Thorium and very few understand it.
Alberta, because of our need to custom manufacture for the oil industry has every capability to build and mass produce Thorium reactors. We have more machine shops in Edmonton, for instance, than any other city in North America. We also have every trade including the best technologies in welding and fabricating. This is where Thorium reactors should be built.
How do we sell the idea to government and the public?

Tom Salken
Edmonton, Alberta

I appreciate the work you are doing to make the
public aware of the great possibilities inherent
in the use of Thorium as a nuclear fuel. I have
a minor comment and a follow-on question:

Under essay3rs (presumably index.htm), you write:

Many, many recycles of the fuel would be needed to “burn-down” the uranium-238 present in the original spent fuel …

Don’t you mean uranium-235 here?

And, a clarifing question for me:
I think your comments about U-233 being 5 neutron captures away from transuranics is really important.
In one or more of your videos, you make the comment that transuranics created in the reactor are ‘burned up’, which I interpreted to be they would transmute up or down (mainly, down) the periodic table in response to their exposure to neutrons, alpha, beta or gamma rays.

Was I hearing you correctly, or does the essay3rs paper imply that, after 5 or more neutron captures, there will be in fact a small residual of transuranics that will not be ‘burned up’ and will have to be stored for 250K years or so (a far smaller amount than normal reactors, but still, something which needs the be delt with)?

Thanks for your response in advance!